At Last

The book arrived over a week ago but I've been trying to fit a new kitchen since then so there has been no opportunity to make a start. The kitchen is now finished, however, and I have had chance to read the first couple of chapters. Although this hasn't left me much the wiser as to the capabilities of Processing, nor closer to making a choice as to which chunk I'd like to write, I have to say the book at least seems promising as I like Greenberg's writing style and he seems genuinely enthusiastic about the subject.

I plan to get as far into the book as possible before reaching a decision about my choice of chunk - but obviously if all the intersesting stuff starts to disappear I may have to revise this plan.

As well as making a start on the book, I have also downloded the software and been through some of the tutorials on the Processing website. All I can say for the moment is that it seems quite interesting and that I look forward to delving deeper. I am especially interested in how it compares to Flash which I have used quite a bit in the past.

Introduction

My name is Neil Petrie and I'm a 41 year old computing student with the Open University. I've just finished what I hope was my penultimate year of a BSc Computing degree, with only the Computing Project and a course on AI to go in 2009.

I live in West Sussex with my wife, Lesley, and two dogs, Ruby & Java. (I know - but honestly it was a cooincidence; Ruby came with the name already installed.) I'm a free-lance web designer and part-time dog trainer although you'd never guess it if you'd met mine.

In my free time I read lots of books of most genres, walk the W. Sussex countryside, listen to (mostly) loud music, play computer games, watch football, rugby, cricket & motor cycling (Arsenal, Gloucester, Sussex and Hayden if you're interested) and perform poorly executed DIY.

This blog will form part of my contribution to the Mass Writing Project being run by Darrel Ince of the OU. I've no idea how things are going to go as I have never been involved in anything like this before and also have never written a blog before.

So, here goes...